Bill 19 reform

[farmers_son]

That would have been my hope too.

The market our calves would have gone to would have been Italy. We were going to receive a premium for the calves but we had to jump through quite a few hoops to prove they were hormone free; hiring vets to inspect the calves until they were slaughter weight and so on. All of which cost quite a bit and would have easten up most or all of any premium. Still we wanted to do it because it seemed like a good thing.

We had a relatively small window of time to get the calves enrolled as they needed a special tag before branding. Ranchers would not enroll our calves until they had a solid sale and there were no solid sales in time before our calves were too old. It turned out best in the end because Ranchers folded before our calves would have been slaughter weight so we saved the expense of verifying they were hormone free.

Why Ranchers Beef folded would make a very interesting case study for business students interested in ag financing. It was not just about ATB.

[rkaiser]

That's right FS, it was more than ATB. Any new start up has it's challenges. Did you invest in Ranchers FS? Or were you simply trying to get a premium for your calves? Your vision was there. To see our domestic supply shrunk by taking beef out of our North American system. On a conventional level, that is one of the only ways we are going to drive price higher. But had you and a few more folks invested rather than simply tried to make a few bucks yourselves, maybe ranchers could have flown. It was mostly about money, and maybe a bit about the way our so called major industry players -- ABP/CCA -- lined up with the government at the time rather than challenge the feds to let Ranchers test for BSE, comply over time with CFIA rules and allow the brave investors a bit more time to get things working better.

Are you going to teach these kids you speak of ---- the right way to do business FS?

[Sawbones]

CFIA is one of the main stumbling blocks to the EU marketplace. We should not have to verify calves prior to weaning for them to become eligible for EU. We should have herd certification for those producers who wish to raise their animals without hormones and all their cattle could be marketed in that manner. The EU has a tremendous opportunity for young cows..the preference in France for 3-4 year old cows. We have to get CFIA to reduce their regulatory burden and then find a packer who is willing to export cattle in sufficient numbers.

[rkaiser]

Find a packer who will do it....HA sorry sawbones... But that is the true problem. There is no small packer interested because they are simply trying to survive and our now "two" multinational players have no interest in decreasing their wonderful little captive supply of grain fed beeves when they can guarantee profit within our North American borders.

And yes FS there is lots of potential for export but the risk involved for players like this is outbalanced by this guaranteed profit on a world wide basis.

We need a packer all right... But that packer needs to give a rats as about the producer ---- as in --- producer owned. Pulling beef into a market that is starving for it.

Honestly --- if we don't take this cash from the BSE class action suit and buy our industry back --- we will be nothing more than a bunch of those rig boys with their big toys when the market crashes again.

The problem is packer domination.....plain and simple.

[rkaiser]

Sorry -- didn't means to end it there. The next problem above even the packers is the retailer who is using our product to draw customers in there little game of lost leader.

Both of these problems can be solved with pressure on supply. It is simple economics boys. We get product off this continent and our price increases. If the average consumer wants to eat South American beef and our government allows more imports. Well that's their loss. We supply those who want our grain fed product with our grain fed product at a premium price.

But it is painfully obvious after all these years that we cannot depend on anyone but ourselves to do it. We have to sell the beef, not just the cattle OURSELVES.

[grassfarmer]

On the Ranchers topic I'm interested to see that no-one mentioned the role of Cargill and their threatening of Calgary CO-OPs. Rather than ignore this I think this is where one of the biggest lessons needs to be learned. We absolutely have to change the system in this country so this kind of crap is not acceptable ever again. If we don't we're wasting our time - whether it be Ranchers Beef or any other entity above the scale of a farmer direct marketing to customers.
We have a broken marketplace that needs fixing and talk of exporting "Cdn beef" to the EU really is academic as long as it can only be killed at Brooks or High River. It has no chance of boosting producers incomes. Yes, we need to export off this continent but this will only work if it is killed at an alternate slaughter plant - and preferably one that can remain open for more that 12 months which looks unlikely in the current arena.

[Sawbones]

Grassfarmer, I've heard the references to Cargill and Calgary Co-op but am short on details. I know that Nilssons threatened Federated and they also broke Blue mountain by under cutting the ground meat price but i don't know the specifics on Calgary Co-op

[grassfarmer]

I didn't get real great details either - but it did come from my local MLA which presumably lends a bit of credibility. Same old story - "you'd better be sure you can get all your beef products from Ranchers because if you can't and you continue to deal with them you will get no supply from us."